Inside Politics: Root canals, colonoscopies more popular than Congress

He says making marijuana legal would introduce a new substance comparable to alcohol and tobacco that would cause more public health problems than it would solve.

Mr. Kennedy also says he is skeptical about medical marijuana. He says it misdirects compassion for those who suffer from cancer and other diseases to support for an extreme drug policy.

Rhode Island allows the regulated use and cultivation of marijuana to treat some medical conditions.

WHITE HOUSE

Evers’ widow to give inaugural invocation

The widow of slain civil rights activist Medgar Evers will deliver the invocation at President Obama’s second inauguration on Jan. 21.

The Presidential Inaugural Committee announced Tuesday that Myrlie Evers-Williams would deliver the prayer. It comes 50 years after her husband was fatally shot in the driveway of his Mississippi home. The inauguration falls on Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

Mrs. Evers-Williams is a distinguished scholar at Alcorn State University in Lorman, Miss. She was chairwoman of the NAACP from 1995 to 1998.

Inaugural organizers said the Rev. Louie Giglio of Atlanta’s Passion City Church will deliver the benediction for Mr. Obama’s swearing-in.

In a statement, Mr. Obama says Mrs. Evers-Williams and Mr. Giglio represent the ideals of justice, equality and opportunity that he pursues.